Instant Karma

by Marissa Meyer

  “You three are always welcome,” he says. “But try not to take too much advantage of my free-refill policy, yeah?”

  We thank him for the chips as he saunters off to tend to another table.

  Jude sits back and dusts off his hands. “Done.”

  I look up from a photo of an anglerfish. “What? Already?”

  “It’s only two hundred and fifty words. And this assignment isn’t going to count for anything. Trust me, Pru, this is just the tyrannical overlord’s way of testing our loyalty. Don’t overthink it.”

  I scowl. He and I both know it’s impossible for me not to overthink.

  “That’s a good one,” says Ari, gesturing with her chip toward the book. A speck of salsa lands on the corner of the page. “Oops, sorry.”

  I wipe off the splotch with my napkin. “I do not want to be an anglerfish.”

  “The assignment isn’t to say what you would be,” says Jude, “just what sort of adaptation could be useful.”

  “You’d have a built-in flashlight,” adds Ari. “That would come in handy.”

  I hum thoughtfully. It’s not terrible. I could work in something about being a shining light in dark times, which may be a bit poetic for a science paper, but still. “Okay, fine,” I say, pulling the laptop back in front of me. I save Jude’s document before starting my own.

  I’ve just finished my first paragraph when there’s a commotion at the front of the restaurant. I glance over to see a woman wheeling in a handcart stacked with speakers, electronic equipment, a small television, a stack of thick three-ring binders, and bundles of cords.

  “You made it!” says Carlos from behind the bar, loud enough that suddenly everyone is looking at the woman. She pauses, blinking into the dim light, letting her eyes adjust from the bright afternoon sun. Carlos rushes over to her and takes the cart. “I’ll take that. I thought we’d set up right over here.”

  “Oh, thank you,” she says, pushing back a long fringe of hair that’s been dyed candy-apple red. Other than the bangs that nearly cover her eyes, her hair is tied into a hasty topknot, showing her natural blond growing out at the roots. She’s wearing clothes that demand attention: worn and faded cowboy boots; dark jeans that are as much shredded holes as they are denim; a burgundy velvet tank top; enough jewelry to sink a small boat. It’s a far cry from the flip-flops and surf shorts that usually populate Main Street this time of year.

  She’s also beautiful. Stunning, actually. But it’s kind of hard to tell given the coating of black eyeliner and smudged purple lipstick. If she’s local, then we would definitely have noticed her around, but I’m sure I’ve never seen her before.

  “How’s this?” says Carlos, ignoring the fact that most of his customers are staring at the two of them.

  “Perfect. Lovely,” says the woman with a bit of a southern accent. Carlos often hosts live music on the weekends, and they’re standing on the little platform where the bands perform. She takes a second to inspect the area before pointing at the wall. “Is that the only outlet?”

  “There’s another behind here.” Carlos pulls a busing station away from the corner.

  “Excellent.” The woman spends some time turning in a circle, inspecting the TVs that hang throughout the restaurant, almost always showing sports. “Yeah, great. This will work. Nice place you’ve got.”

  “Thanks. You want help setting up, or…?”

  “Naw, I’ve got it. Not my first time at the rodeo.” She shoos him away.

  “All right, fine.” Carlos takes a step back. “Can I get you a drink?”

  “Oh. Uh…” She thinks about it for a few seconds. “Shirley Temple?”

  Carlos laughs. “Sure thing.”

  He returns to the bar, and the woman starts moving tables around and setting up the equipment she brought. After a few minutes, she grabs the stack of binders and approaches the nearest table. Our table.

  “Well, don’t you all just look like some upstanding Fortuna Beach youth?” she says, taking in our textbooks and computers.

  “What’s going on?” says Ari, nodding toward all the stuff she brought.

  “Weekly karaoke night!” says the woman. “Well, this is actually the first, but we’re hoping it’ll become a weekly thing.”

  Karaoke? I’m immediately overcome with visions of crooning old people and squawking middle-aged ladies and a whole lot of drunks who can’t carry a tune and … oh no. So much for our quiet study session. At least the school year is pretty much over.

  “I’m Trish Roxby and I’ll be your host,” she continues. Noticing our less-than-enthused expressions, she juts her thumb toward the bar. “Y’all didn’t notice the signs? Carlos told me he’s been advertising for a couple weeks now.”

  I glance toward the bar. It takes a minute, but then I notice. On the chalkboard by the door, above the listing of daily specials, in messy handwriting, someone has scrawled the words: JOIN US FOR WEEKLY KARAOKE, EVERY TUESDAY AT 6:00, STARTING IN JUNE.

  “So, think you’ll be joining in tonight?” asks Trish.

  “No,” Jude and I say in unison.

  Ari just bites her lower lip, eyeing the binder.

  Trish laughs. “It’s not as scary as it sounds. I promise, it can be a whole lotta fun. Besides, girls like to be serenaded, you know.”

  Realizing she’s speaking to him, Jude immediately starts to squirm. “Uh. No. This is my twin sister.” He tilts his head toward me, then gestures between himself and Ari. “And we’re not…” He trails off.

  “Really? Twin sister?” says Trish, ignoring whatever he and Ari aren’t. She looks between me and Jude for a moment, before slowly nodding. “Yeah, okay. I can see it now.”

  She’s lying. No one ever believes that Jude and I are related, much less twins. We look nothing alike. He’s six foot one and skinny like our dad. I’m five five and curvy like Mom. (Our grandma loves to joke that I took all of Jude’s “baby fat” when we were in the womb and kept it for myself. I never found that joke particularly funny when we were kids, and it has not improved with age. Insert eye-roll emoji here.)

  Jude is blond and super pale. Like, vampirical pale. His skin burns within thirty seconds of stepping into the sunlight, which makes living in Southern California not completely ideal. I, on the other hand, am brunette and will be sporting a halfway-decent tan by the end of June. Jude has cheekbones. I’ve got dimples. Jude has full-on mood lips that make him look a bit like an Abercrombie model, though he hates when I say that. And me? Well, at least I have my lipstick.

  Trish clears her throat awkwardly. “So, you ever done karaoke before?”

  “No,” Ari answers. “Though I’ve thought about it.”

  Jude and I exchange looks because, actually, we have done karaoke before. Lots of times. Growing up, our parents used to take us to this gastropub that had family-friendly karaoke on the first Sunday of each month. We’d belt out Beatles song after Beatles song, and my dad would always end “his set,” as he called it, with “Dear Prudence,” then call us all up together for “Hey Jude.” By the end of it, the entire restaurant would be singing—Naaaa na na … nananana! Even Penny would join in, even though she was only two or three years old and probably had no idea what was going on. It was sort of magical.

  A little nostalgic part of me lights up to think of Dad’s slightly off-key rendition of “Penny Lane” or Mom’s over-the-top attempts at “Hey Bulldog.”

  But then there was one time, when I couldn’t have been more than ten or eleven years old, when some drunk in the audience shouted—Maybe that kid should spend less time singing and more time doing sit-ups!

  We all knew who he was talking about. And, well, the magic was pretty much ruined after that.

  Come to think of it, that might have been the start of my public-speaking anxiety, and that all-encompassing fear that everyone will be watching me, criticizing me, waiting for me to embarrass myself.

  “Well, you kids just think it over,” says Trish, setting the binder down n
ext to the chips. She takes a pen and some slips of paper from a pocket and sets them down, too. “If you find a song you wanna sing, just write it down here and pass it up to me, all right? And if the song you want isn’t in the book, you let me know. Sometimes I can find it online.” She winks at us, then wanders off to the next table.

  We all spend a few seconds staring at the binder like it’s a poisonous snake.

  “Yeah,” Jude mutters, and starts tossing his things into his backpack. “That’s not going to happen.”

  I feel exactly the same way. You couldn’t pay me to get up and sing in front of a bunch of strangers. Or non-strangers, for that matter. Fortuna Beach isn’t a big town, and it’s impossible to go anywhere without running into someone you sort of know. Even now, glancing around, I notice my mom’s hairstylist at the bar, and a manager from the corner grocery store at one of the small tables.

  Ari, however, is still staring at the binder. Her eyes spark with yearning.

  I’ve heard Ari sing. She isn’t bad. At least, I know she can stay in key. Besides that, she wants to be a songwriter. Has dreamed of being a songwriter since she was a kid. And we all know that to have any sort of success at all, there will be times when she’s probably going to have to sing.

  “You should give it a try,” I say, nudging the binder toward her.

  She flinches. “I don’t know. What would I even sing?”

  “Like, any song recorded in the past hundred years?” says Jude.

  She gives him a look, even though it’s clear his comment pleases her. Ari loves music. All music. She’s a walking Wikipedia of everything from 1930s jazz to eighties punk to modern indie. In fact, we probably never would have met if it wasn’t for her obsession. My parents own a record store a block from Main Street, Ventures Vinyl, named after a popular surf-rock band from the sixties. Ari started shopping there when we were in middle school. The allowance her parents gave her was way more than I ever got, and every month she would bring in the money she’d saved and buy as many records as she could afford.

  My parents adore Ari. They joke that she’s their sixth child. They like to say that Ari has single-handedly kept them in business these past few years, which would be charming if I wasn’t afraid that it might actually be close to the truth.

  “We could duet?” says Ari, looking at me hopefully.

  I bite back the instinctual and impassioned no, and instead gesture hopelessly at my textbook. “Sorry. I’m still trying to finish this paper.”

  She frowns. “Jude wrote his in ten minutes. Come on. Maybe a Beatles song?” I’m not sure if she suggests this because of how much I love the Beatles, or because they’re the only band for which I could be trusted to know most of the words. Growing up around the record store, my siblings and I have been inundated with a variety of music over the years, but no one, in my parents’ eyes, will ever compete with the Beatles. They even named each of their five kids after a Beatles song—“Hey Jude,” “Dear Prudence,” “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds,” “Penny Lane,” and “Eleanor Rigby.”

  Realizing that Ari is still waiting for a response, I sigh. “Maybe. I don’t know. I need to finish this.” As she continues flipping through the songbook, I try to return my focus to the paper.

  “A Shirley Temple sounds pretty good,” says Jude. “Anyone else want one?”

  “A little girly, don’t you think?” I tease.

  He shrugs, sliding out of the booth. “I’m comfortable enough in my masculinity.”

  “I want your cherry!” Ari calls after him.

  “Hey, that’s my brother you’re hitting on.”

  Jude pauses, looks at me, then Ari, then proceeds to blush bright red.

  She and I both burst into laughter. Jude shakes his head and walks toward the bar. I cup my hands over my mouth to shout after him, “Yes, get some for us, too!”

  He waves without looking to let me know he heard me.

  We’re not supposed to cross the rail that divides the twenty-one-and-over area from the rest of the restaurant, so Jude stops at the invisible barrier to give the bartender our order.

  I’m one more paragraph into the paper when Jude returns, carrying three tall glasses filled with fizzing pink soda and extra cherries in each one. Without asking, Ari takes a spoon and scoops out the cherries from both mine and Jude’s and plops them into her own glass.

  “Hello, everyone, and welcome to our very first weekly karaoke night!” says Carlos, speaking into a microphone that Trish brought with her. “I’m Carlos and I run this joint. I really appreciate your business and hope you all have a fun time tonight. Don’t be shy. We’re all friends here, so come on up and give it your best! With that, I’m pleased to introduce our karaoke host, Trish Roxby.”

  There’s a smattering of applause as Trish takes the mic and Carlos starts to head back to the kitchen.

  “Whoa, whoa, aren’t you gonna sing?” Trish says.

  Carlos turns around, eyes wide with horror. He chuckles lightly. “Maybe next week?”

  “I’ll hold you to that,” says Trish.

  “I said maybe,” says Carlos, retreating some more.

  Trish grins at the restaurant patrons. “Hello, folks, I’m so excited to be here tonight. I know nobody ever likes to go first, so I’ll get this party started. Please do bring up those slips of paper and let me know what you wanna sing tonight, otherwise you’ll be stuck listening to me for the next three hours.”

  She punches something into her machine and a guitar riff blares through the speakers—Joan Jett’s “I Love Rock and Roll.”

  I try not to groan, but … come on. How am I supposed to focus on finishing this paper with that playing in the background? This is a restaurant, not a rock concert.

  “So, uh, this is unexpected,” says Jude.

  “I know,” says Ari, nodding appreciatively. “She’s really good.”

  “Not that,” says Jude, elbowing me in the side. “Pru, look. It’s Quint.”

  FOUR

  My head bolts up. For a second I’m sure Jude is playing a practical joke on me. But no—there he is. Quint Erickson, loitering next to the SEAT YOURSELF sign just inside the doorway. He’s with a girl I don’t recognize—Asian, petite, with her hair tied in two messy buns behind her ears. She’s wearing denim shorts and a faded T-shirt that has a picture of Bigfoot on it with the words HIDE-AND-SEEK WORLD CHAMPION printed underneath.

  Unlike Quint, who is watching Trish sing her heart out, the girl is engrossed by something on her phone.

  “Whoa,” says Ari, leaning over the table and lowering her voice, even though there’s no way anyone can hear us over Trish Roxby’s guttural demand to put another coin in the jukebox, baby. “That’s Quint? The Quint?”

  I frown. “What do you mean, the Quint?”

  “What? He’s all you’ve talked about this year.”

  A laugh escapes me, harsh and humorless. “He is not!”

  “He kind of is,” says Jude. “I don’t know which of us is more excited for summer to start. You, so you won’t have to deal with him anymore, or me, so I don’t have to listen to you complain about him.”

  “He’s cuter than I imagined,” says Ari.

  “Oh yeah, he’s a stud,” says Jude. “Everyone loves Quint.”

  “Only because his ridiculousness appeals to the lowest common denominator of society.”

  Jude snorts.

  “Besides”—I lower my voice—“he’s not that attractive. Those eyebrows.”

  “What do you have against his eyebrows?” says Ari, looking at me as if maybe I should be ashamed for suggesting such a thing.

  “Please. They’re huge,” I say. “Plus, his head is a weird shape. It’s, like … square.”

  “Biased much?” mutters Ari, shooting me a teasing look that crawls straight beneath my skin.

  “I’m just saying.”

  I won’t relent on this point. It’s true that Quint is not unattractive. I know this. Anyone with eyes knows this. But ther
e’s no elegance to his features. He has boring, nondescript, basic brown eyes, and while I’m sure he must have eyelashes, they’ve never once caught my attention. And with his perpetual suntan, short wavy hair, and that idiotic grin of his, he pretty much looks like every other surfboard-loving boy in town. Which is to say, completely forgettable.

  I put my fingers back on the keyboard, refusing to let Quint or karaoke or anything else derail my focus. This is the last homework assignment of sophomore year. I can do this.

  “Hey, Quint!” yells Jude, his hand shooting up into the air in greeting.

  My jaw falls. “You traitor!”

  Jude turns to me, grimacing. “Sorry, Sis. He caught my eye. I panicked.”

  I take in a slow breath through my nostrils and dare to glance toward the front of the restaurant. Sure enough, Quint and his friend are making their way toward us. Quint is grinning, as per usual. He’s like one of those dopey puppies that are incapable of realizing when they’re surrounded by cat people. They just assume that everyone is happy to see them, all the time.

  “Jude, what’s up?” says Quint. His attention swoops to me and he takes in my textbook and computer, his smile hardening just a tiny bit. “Prudence. Hard at work, as always.”

  “Quality work doesn’t just appear out of thin air,” I say.

  He snaps his fingers. “You know, I used to think that, but after a year of working with you, I’m beginning to wonder.”

  My eyes narrow. “Sure was nice running into you.” My sarcasm is so thick I almost choke on it. I look back down at the screen. It takes me a second to remember what the assignment was.

  “Quint,” says Jude, “this is our friend Araceli. Araceli, Quint.”

  “Hey,” says Quint. I look up through my lashes as they bump fists. With Quint initiating, it seems like the smoothest, most natural greeting in the world, even though I don’t think I’ve ever seen Ari fist-bump anyone before. “Nice to meet you, Araceli. Cool name. You don’t go to our school, do you?”